


Truth Be Told, I'm Lying

by Idzzdi



Category: BBC Radio 1 RPF, One Direction (Band)
Genre: (kinda), Banter, Established Relationship, Fights, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, M/M, Phone Calls & Telephones, Secret Relationship, Secrets, call or delete
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-06
Updated: 2016-01-06
Packaged: 2018-05-12 05:51:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5654776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Idzzdi/pseuds/Idzzdi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Collette! I'm really, seriously dating Louis.”<br/>“Oh, come on, Grim! I know you're joking.”<br/>“I'm not joking!” Nick yells back, letting out an exhausted laugh.</p><p>or: for a thing i saw on tumblr about an au where nick calls collette to tell her he's dating louis and she thinks its call or delete</p>
            </blockquote>





	Truth Be Told, I'm Lying

**Author's Note:**

> So, idk. This just happened. It was supposed to be a drabble but it kinda wrote itself, so yeah.  
> Hope you like it :)
> 
> oh yeah, the title is from TAAR's 'gives you hell' as you all probably know already..

„So um, have you like, uh, told everyone? Or like, anyone really?“ Louis mumbles against Nick's chest. Nick rustles around for a while, shifting Louis' body in the process. Louis tweaks his side and grunts in discomfort, but Nick only pinches him back lightly and shuffles Louis around in his lap, shifting him up his chest a bit more.

“What'd you say?” he mumbles back after a while, sounding sleepy. They're both rather tired, still wrung out from their party antics last night and messy handjobs afterwards, the alcohol they'd had clouding Louis' memory of it all.

“I asked if you've told your friends and stuff,” Louis mumbles again, snuggling closer into Nick's chest. It's a perfect lazy Sunday afternoon and Nick knows well enough that he is never to speak about how much Louis loves a good cuddle every now and then. (It's not like people don't know, but Louis can ignore that.)

Louis' hand rests next to his head on Nick's chest and he swears he can feel Nick's heart skip a beat.

“Um,” Nick starts aimlessly, letting the statement end in a long hum.

“You didn't tell them,” Louis says after a while, letting out a low sigh. He doesn't mean to show his disappointment, but he can't really look at Nick's face either right now, so he turns his face against Nick's chest, clenching his jaw tightly.

“Well, I uh,” Nick starts quickly, raising his hands defensively around Louis' body. “I- What are we even talking about, I mean.. Have I told whom? What?”

Louis punches him in lieu of a verbal reply. He punches Nick in the stomach and not too lightly, making the older man double over nearly crushing Louis' face between his knees and chest.

“Jesus, _Lou_ ,” he curses, holding his stomach.

“I fucking hate you, you know that?” Louis tells him, scooting further away on the sofa. He gives Nick an icy glare, only feeling a little bit bad about the stomach punching.

“Oh, come on,” Nick groans, slowly letting go of his sides, rubbing them soothingly. He's looking rather normal again so really Louis' punch couldn't have been that bad.

When Nick reaches out to put a hand on Louis' thigh Louis only swats his hand away and gets up, walking around the sofa to stand on the other side of the room.

“Lou, come on, don't be like that,” Nick says pleadingly. “It's.. it's different for me.”

“Please do tell, _how_ is it different for you?” Louis snaps, pointedly facing away from Nick.

“I- you and the boys are like brothers! That's something entirely different!”

“Have you told your brother, then?” Louis snaps.

“What, Lou, I-” Nick stops for a moment. “You know Andy and I aren't like that.”

“So what's with all of your friends then? Aimie and Ian and whatever they're called,” Louis gives back, like he doesn't know very well what Nick's friends' names are. “You know most of them twice as long as I know the boys!”

It's a testimony to the seriousness of the conversation that neither of them mention the apparent age gap between them that allows Nick to know people twice as long as Louis. Louis' usually not one to pass up a chance to make fun of how _old_ Nick is.

“And never since I've known them I've mentioned going out with you is something I'd fancy. What do you think they'll say when I tell them I've been secretly dating you for like.. I dunno couple months? They're gonna skin me alive if I tell them now!” Nick reasons, and Louis can see him slowly getting from the sofa from the corner of his eyes.

“So you're just.. never gonna tell them?” Louis asks and he means to snap at Nick and be angry, but the shakiness of his own voice takes him by surprise.

“No, Lou, look,” Nick says quickly stepping around the sofa and closer towards Louis. Louis turns away from him again and shrugs off the hands Nick puts on his shoulders.

“I- I don't mean never, I just. Give me some time to sort this out?” Nick says pleadingly and Louis can almost hear him run his hands through his hair in distress.

“Give you time?” he asks icily, slowly turning around towards him. “You've had _plenty_ of time! I mean, I told the boys _months_ ago!” he says with a bit more force than he means to. Nick looks at him like that's new information to him. Thinking about it Louis assumes it probably is. “You think it wasn't awkward when I told them? Of course it was! Harry was all mopey no one told him sooner and Liam was more excited than my mom and like, Niall asked a whole bunch of inappropriate questions. But, you know, I thought if this was gonna be a proper grown up relationship that's the shit I gotta do to make it work. Unfortunately however, I seem to be the only one interested in making this thing work, so..” he finishes of his rant and gives Nick a long look, that makes him squirm.

“No, Lou,” he starts, reaching out for Louis again, but thinking better of it mid-motion and letting his arm hover awkwardly between them.

“Let's not, uh, overreact,” he says at them same time as Louis says “I should probably go now.”

“No, no,” Nicks says right away, flopping his arms around helplessly. Louis waits for a few moments to see if Nick going to do something and then turns on his heel to walk into the hallway, where he collects his shoes from the floor by the door.

“Oh fuck shit,” he hears Nick curse behind him before he comes sliding down the hallway on his socks. “Dont- don't go. I'll call Collette! Right now,” he promises with wide eyes and Louis stops mid-motion raising an eyebrow at Nick.

Collette is not who Louis would have started with, since she's truly the one who is most likely to be after Nick's blood for not telling her any sooner. He probably would have started with sweet, little Pixie or one of the guys, who probably wouldn't care so much. At the same time is Collette the ultimate proof of commitment to the whole thing, so Louis stays and watches as Nick scrambles back into the living room to collect his cell phone, already scrolling through it as he stumbles back into the hallway. He stops scrolling after a while, finger hovering over the touch screen as he shoots Louis one last pleading look. Louis only shrugs at him and raises his arm to grab his jacket from the coat rack, when Nick curses again (“ _God dammit_ , Lou!”), touches the screen one last time and holds the phone up to his ear.

It's quiet enough in the hallway for Louis to hear the beeping sound of the phone ringing. Nick looks up at him anxiously, biting his lip, his ankles crossed awkwardly. Louis is stood there with his shoes still in his hand, slowly shifting his weight to lean against the wall to watch as Collette answers the call on the other end.

“Hey love!” he answers, a bit overly exited to Louis' ears. He knows Collette picked up on it too when soon after Nick gives a ridiculously fake laugh and replies “No, no, everything's fine. Just perfect!”

Nick lingers for a bit, avoiding Louis' eyes and staring down at his sockless feet. It's quiet again and Louis assumes Collette is waiting too, because he can't hear her chatter coming from the other end.

“So, uh,” Nick starts awkwardly after a while, “there's this thing I've been meaning to tell you.” He lingers for another moment, taking a deep breath. “You know Louis, right? Louis Tomlinson from One Direction and uh, yeah.”

Collette says something presumably sassy back and Nick nods. “Yeah, of course, you met him, I remember. So uh.. Louis, Louis Tomlinson, and I uh.. have been going out. Kinda,” he finishes and bites down on his lower lip hard, meeting Louis' eyes for a moment. To Louis' own surprise he finds himself biting down on his lips too, his breath caught somewhere in his stomach, anxiously awaiting Collette's reply. It's not like he thinks Nick's friends are going to disapprove of him in general, but Nick's friends are important to Nick and if Louis wants to keep him around it's probably important for him too, that Nick's friends don't flat out hate him. He kind of didn't think this through beforehand.

Louis expects a lot of replies, but what he doesn't expect is for Collette to laugh at Nick loud enough for Louis to hear all the way across the hall.

“You're joking!” she shrieks, laughing some more. Nick blinks back at Louis for a moment.

“I'm not joking,” he replies then, completely serious.

“Yes, you are!” Collette replies then, still giggling. “You're on that bloody radio thing you do!”

“I'm really not,” Nick says, giving Louis a weary look. Louis has to admit, this is kind of funny. He steps closer and motions for Nick to let him hear what Collette says back.

“Oh, shut up Grim! Is Tina there? Can I greet some people?”

“Collette! I'm really, seriously dating Louis.”

“Oh, come on, Grims! I know you're joking.”

“I'm not joking!” Nick yells back, letting out an exhausted laugh. “I'm really, really not! He's- he's literally stood right in front of me right now.”

“Of course he is,” Collette replies sarcastically.

“No, but he really is. We just fought about me not telling you about us, so now I'm telling you that Louis here and I are really, truly dating,” Nick goes on, the tips of his ears going a light shade of pink. Louis watches in amusement, his lips curling up without his permission. It's not too bad when he sees Nick lighting up the tiniest bit as well.

“Well,” Collette starts and hesitates, “I'll believe the bit where the two of you fought, but the rest..”

“Collette, I-” Nick starts, letting out a low chuckle. “I thought you were gonna rip me head off! Not that you wouldn't believe me.”

“Yeah, well,” she replies slowly, starting to sound like she's considering. “He's right there you said?” she asks then, perking up a bit.

“Yeah, right here,” Nick confirms, knitting his eyebrows together in confusion.

“Lemme speak to him,” she says then and Nick rolls his eyes, extending the phone towards Louis. He says “She wants to speak with you,” like Louis hadn't just heard the entire conversation. Louis eyes Nick's phone suspiciously and then presses his lips together tightly, giving Nick a half grin as he slowly shakes his head.

Nick only looks back in confusion, holding the phone closer towards Louis who only keeps shaking his head.

“What's this?” Nick asks in confusion, waving the phone around again from which Louis can hear Collette ask “Hey? Hello?”, dragging out the words. Louis locks his eyes with Nicks and then mimes locking his lips and throwing away the key silently as Nick's only groans in reply.

“What is wrong with you, child?” he asks, his eyes going wide. “Speak to her, she's not gonna kill you!”

Louis only shakes his head again.

“What- what? _You_ wanted me to tell her! Now speak with her or she won't believe it!” Nick reasons, trying to push the phone up against Louis' ear, but Louis ducks away, pulling his shoulders up his ears.

“Louis,” Nick warns, but Louis doges his arm and then sprints back into the living room to hide behind the sofa. Nick comes after him while speaking into the phone.

“No, I _swear_ he's here, he's a hundred percent serious right now running away from me. No, yeah, I know it sounds stupid, believe I wouldn't make it up if it weren't true!” Nick rounds the sofa and Louis gets up from his hiding place, hopping over the backrest of the sofa to run down the hallway again and into Nick's bedroom. Collette really must be a great friend because she stays on the line all the while Nick chases Louis through his flat from the bedroom though the hallway up and down until Louis disappears into the kitchen, taking a corner a bit too sharp and pulling down the drying rack with him as falls onto the ground. To Louis' defense most of the dishes didn't even break, but he can hear Nick yelp from the hallway muttering into the phone “No, I don't know, that's why I'm keeping the good china in the upper shelves anyway.”

When he enters the kitchen and finds Louis lying on his back with dishes and cutlery splattered all around him and sighs down the phone. “Listen, I'll have to make sure he's not hit his head too hard. I'll speak to you..” he trails off and then gives his phone an odd look.

“She hung up on me,” he tells Louis with a startled expression on his face.

“Com'ere” Louis mumbles towards him, extending his arms in Nick's general direction. Nick watches him for a moment and gives him a long, suffering look.

“What's with you then?” he asks, sounding the tiniest bit fond, but mostly exhausted. Louis is a horrible boyfriend. Nick reaches out to take one of Louis' extended hands, but instead of lying down with him, he hauls Louis up from between the partly broken dishes and pulls him towards the sofa where he lets the boy lie down against his chest.

“So,” Nick prompts after a while, slowly stroking up and down Louis' spine. “You wanna tell me what that was all about?”

Louis shrugs slowly, rubbing his nose against Nick's chest.

“Sorry about the dishes,” he mumbles eventually.

“Well, for one I know you're not really sorry at all, and secondly that's not what I was referring to,” Nick replies lowly, his mouth close to Louis' ear.

“I am sorry though!” Louis protests. “You're Vogue mug was on that rack, it could have broken.”

“It didn't though, did it?” Nick asks quickly and has a ghost of a smile dancing across Louis' lips. He always knew that that was Nick's favorite mug.

“No. Know it's your favorite though,” he hums, almost sleepily again now. He barely notices Nick's hand halt for a second before he resumes petting down Louis' back. They lie in silence for a while and Louis enjoys the even motion of Nick's chest rising and falling with his breath underneath his cheek, lulling him into a sleepy state of mind.

“Why didn't you speak with Collette?” Nick asks eventually and Louis just shrugs again, turning his face into Nick's chest.

“Guess I wanted to keep you for myself a bit longer,” he admits after a long pause, surprising himself with his honestly. Nick nuzzles into his hair in reply, pressing a lingering kiss against Louis' temple.

“'m glad you told her, though,” Louis tacks on for good measure and then presses his eyes shut and tries to press even closer into Nick's chest. Nick's arm tighten their hold around Louis' shoulders and maybe those admissions weren't as baring as they felt.

Later, when Louis has drifted off into a half sleeping state he vaguely registers Nick taking a picture of the two of them dozing off on the sofa and not even two minutes later his phone is blowing up with constant messages and phone calls.

 

**Author's Note:**

> You enjoy? You kudos! You comment! Me love you forever!
> 
> hit me up on tumblr -> hannahazza.tumblr.com


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